Modern communication networks are growing in size and complexity. For example, service providers (or carriers) are transitioning towards converged access networks capable of transporting, not only conventional data, but also voice and multimedia content. As a result, these networks are being pushed to support increased traffic flows in the midst of more sensitive delay restrictions characteristic to voice and multimedia communications. This means that traditional “best-effort” methodologies that are unable to guarantee quality of service (QoS) must give way to techniques, such as resource reservation and prioritization, that are capable of assuring sufficient availability, sequencing, and throughput, as well as diminished latency, jitter, and transportation losses. In order to provide such performance, carriers are aggressively testing infrastructures to validate their services. Unfortunately, current testing techniques that focus on particular network media (e.g., twisted pair, coax, fiber, etc.) or particular services (e.g., data, video, voice, etc.) are proving to be inefficient and, thereby, uneconomical.
Therefore, there is a need for an approach that provides multiservice testing across a broad range of network media.